


ash on my fingertips and soot in my lungs

by cptsuke



Series: i met my king young [1]
Category: Boardwalk Empire
Genre: Alternate Universe - Magical Realism, Gen, M/M
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2016-12-30
Updated: 2016-12-30
Packaged: 2018-09-13 12:49:16
Rating: Mature
Warnings: Graphic Depictions Of Violence
Chapters: 1
Words: 2,003
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/9124402
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/cptsuke/pseuds/cptsuke
Summary: Benny was born with fire in his veins and electricity at his fingertips. His power snaps and snarls like a chained dog and no one believes him when he says it's not on purpose.(later, when he's older, he'll love its unpredictable sharpness, love the way it hurts even as it hurts others more, because it's his in a way not much else is)





	

**Author's Note:**

> weird almost slice of life rambling as i try to get my benny feels together whilst also adding in magic? idek.  
> my writing style in this is a little odd, so apologies for the strange way i apparently decided to punctuate things.

Benny was born with fire in his veins and electricity at his fingertips. His power snaps and snarls like a chained dog and no one believes him when he says it's not on purpose.

(later, when he's older, he'll love its unpredictable sharpness, love the way it _hurts_ even as it hurts others more, because it's _his_ in a way not much else is _)_

Benny's Ma was always on his case, have better control, have better friends. Be a good boy and just _be_ better.

She means well, but like all mothers, what she thinks is good for him isn't always what he wants.

And when she started her shpiel about this nice Suchowlanski boy several blocks down, she's heard he could calm magic at a touch, Benny had gone searching for this Null his mother thought could control him; like Benny needed a leash. But he'd gotten distracted by the craps game he'd found running, then there was this Irish kid he'd had a run in with there and, well, he'd forgotten he'd actually come looking for someone.

The Null could wait, because suddenly there was a gun in play and if the Irish fuck died via bullets instead of Benny's explosive magic then none of his friends could really say who really killed the guy.

But then the police were everywhere and Benny had the gun. Until he didn't.

He'd given the kid that had slapped the gun out of his hands a black eye, punches him because he loses Benny the gun. because Benny could kill a man with his bare hands – with he magic that burns under his skin – but he _wanted_ that gun. Because no one's scared of a 9 year old, no matter how much electricity runs in his veins, but they'll pause at a pistol.

But the guy just takes Benny's hit, like Benny didn't pack the punch, like he don't feel the magic behind it.

(he does, he must, Benny can see it spiderwebbing under the skin where his punch landed)

And even as he'd run with him – away from the street gamblers, away from the cops collaring anyone they could get their hands on - he'd never imagined that by the time the bruising around the guy's eye had turned to an ashy smudge they'd be practically inseparable.

 

(He hits Meyer with ice in his fists once, lashes out with all the Winter's he's ever had, and Meyer just laughs out breaths of fogged air)

 

Meyer's a little fella with a strong accent, no one new ever talks of the old country and Meyer was no different, but Benny see the way he gets wild eyed around fire.

The flame streetmages doing tricks - fire flares, pinwheeling flames and bursting sparks - for whatever change one might have in a pocket found their livelihood dull, sputtering and fizzling, faltering in proximity as Benny and Meyer passed.

And Benny doesn't say a thing about the knife sharp spark in his short friend's eye, maybe curtails his firebombing fun for times Meyer's not around.

 

Benny's not there when Meyer meets Sal - if he had, things would have been different, Benny tells himself, he'd have never let that dago fuck steal his best friend.

He'd made a joke of it, told Meyer he didn't know how to make friends normally, but this _Salvatore_ was nothing like Benny. He'd just wanted to take from Meyer, like anyone had anything to be taken in this neighborhood, the fact that he hadn't didn't change nothing in Benny's mind.

 

Benny didn't see what the big deal was anyway. Sure he had more magic – more _potential_ – than Benny had ever seen.

But it wasn't _his._ He couldn't even use it.

Meyer says he will; voice like a prophet, but Benny doesn't trust no guesses on the future and Meyer was no soothsayer. The only fortune teller that had ever even spoken to Benny had been a tiny thing with wild roaming eyes. She'd told him to mind his friends and tried to poke him in the eye. Her fingernail had cut sharply into his cheek just below and she'd danced away, ran off before he could slap her, or zap her with the static that's always building in his fingertips.

Benny didn't know what her problem had been, he minded Meyer just fine. Had ever since they'd met – or had once Benny had understood that Meyer's reticence had been less about Benny wanting a gun and more him having it on him when there were coppers busting the place.

 

 

Benny explodes in every direction, like a pressure cooker, his magic builds and builds and _builds._ But he's in control, and fuck anyone who says otherwise. It's not Benny's fault. He likes it, likes the electricity that runs in his veins and the sharp bursts, likes the way no one knows what he's gonna do til it's done because there's nothing average about what he's got.

Because no matter how much people tell Benny he's too explosive, he's too wild, too much _everything_ , he owns it. Benny's power is in his blood, his magic is more in his lungs than the air he breathes and there's not one part of him that hasn't had teeth sunk into it, not one part of himself he held back for himself. He's a force of nature because his magic is a hurricane and Benny's never hit landfall yet.

He'd sooner give up breathing than lose the electricity in his veins,

 

Meyer's different from both of them. It took Benny a moment to realize he even had magic. He's so silent, contained, even standing beside him, Benny hadn't really _felt_ anything. Thought he'd been one of those unfortunate souls with Nothing in their bones. But then Meyer had looked at him with eyes that held a sharpness that seemed to cut with a gaze, and Benny hadn't doubted Meyer's quiet soul had more than a special sort of Something in it. Quiet but waiting.

He put his hands on Benny's shoulders sometimes, soothes the sharp cutting of his magic begging for release, dulling without lessening, calming an itch Benny sometimes forgets isn't supposed to be constant.

A gift.

Benny never says nothing, but maybe he antagonizes Sal a little less those days.

 

 

Benny knows Meyer keeps him and Sal separate. Meyer's smart enough to know Benny didn't like most people, and some Italian piece of shit didn't endear himself none.

(the few times they did meet, Benny can see Sal resents him just as much, Meyer's their god and neither of them are built to share well)

But then there's some Irish kid gunning for Meyer and if Benny finds him first he plans to fry him up from the inside but instead Sal beats him to it.

One hot summer day, kids from all over jumping in the cold _cold_ murky river water and it's fun and for once it's like the building pressure of living doesn't exist for just this one day. But Benny's lost sight of Meyer and there's a whisper of _that Irish kid_ from kids Benny's sorta friends with, and it's not worry that's threading through Benny as he shoves past people, it's anger. Rage that that they can't just have this _one_ fucking day.

By the time Benny finds anyone, it's all over.

There's a knife on the riverbank with too much blood on the blade to completely wash off and an Irish boy floats downstream, lifeless and alone.

The water's turned red like a sacrifice and Benny begrudgingly doesn't completely hate Sal.

 

 _I need your help._ _But we need to smart about it._ Meyer asks him one day, with a smooth face and serious eyes.

Benny rolls his eyes because if Meyer's apart of the plan, _of course_ it'll be smart.

It's only when they're over halfway to where they're going that he gets told it's something of favor for Sal.

 _Not a favor, Benny._ Meyer says in his voice of infinite patience running thin.

_What is it then?_

_Personal._ He says that like it costs him something.

Sal's come back from his Hampton Farms fuck up and he's Charlie now, but there's some fucking bull's kid thinks he can send him back upstate. Now Benny don't much like Sal-Charlie-WhateverTheFuck, but Meyer does, and more importantly, if anyone's going to screw with Charlie it should be Benny.

So he goes along with Meyer's plan – would've anyway because it's always a pleasure to watch Meyer's fake child eyes turn sharp and deadly – and in the end it's even easier than either of them had anticipated.

They're two little Jew boys; Benny's _twelve,_ as long as he don't let too much excitement show he looks innocent enough, and Meyer's got big eyes that make him look like something to protect, not someone you should definitely not let lead you into an empty and oh-so-dark alley.

(Benny's a bit bitter that the only reason Charlie's not here to do the deed himself is because Meyer's sent him off to be seen well away from here and even when Benny's the only one here it still makes him feel like a second choice.)

But Meyer lets him take lead so Benny forgives him.

(Benny always forgives him)

The guy's coughing blood and Meyer's saying _Clean, Benny!_ his tone like Benny forgot to put down a coaster and Benny steps back, thinks less _splat_ and more implosion. Benny's magic bites back into him, like teeth gnawing on muscle, like being torn apart from the inside as his magic explodes out him and he loves every second of it.

After, with knife in hand, Meyer punches the organs full of holes so even it can't even think of floating after they weigh it down and dump it in the Hudson.

Benny wonders if it'll ever get found but doesn't much care for an answer. Meyer'd be annoyed though. After they went to all this trouble.

 

 

He sees it before they do. He's not jealous. _He's not_. He doesn't want to fuck Meyer. But he's 14 and it's painful to watch.

It'd be painful if it was only one sided, but there's not enough patience in the world for Benny to stomach hanging around the two when they're both obliviously and mutually pining for each other.

So he cracks more than a few bad jokes, the sort that gains him Meyer's long suffering look and a downright murderous one from Charlie. Benny would stop but he quite likes forcing Meyer to pay attention to him, and Charlie with violence in his eyes reminds Benny that they can maybe get along.

 

The boy with nothing and the boy with too much. They compliment each other like Benny never could.

He's overly distrusting,, he knows that, yearning for something that he can't put it into words. He's got no Sight but Benny can feel a long stretching of time when it's the three of them together, and he Knows one day it'll branch in ways none of them can control.

But what the hell does Benny know? He's just jealous because Meyer's spending all his time with Charlie and Charlie's a grade A jerk at the best of times and still has to bite back his stupid Jew remarks like he can't feel Winter creeping into the room every time he opens his stupid mouth. Benny has no idea why Meyer ever let him stay. (but he does)

 

 

Meyer says they can't kill everyone, he already swallows his rage, learning to bare teeth in a mockery of a smile instead of shooting the anti-Semitic pieces of shit in the face. Pretend that the constant barrage of hate isn't stiffening his spine and putting white in his knuckles.

Because it wasn't good for business, and business was the only way out of the slum they'd been born into.

Benny knows this, he does, but a part of him (a lot of him) thinks he could take them all.

(wants to at least try)

 


End file.
